For most of my formative years, I was thin. And man, could I pack away the food. In fact, I remember an uncle commenting on it at one of my sibling's graduation open houses. "That's like the fourth plate of food you've taken." :shrug: When the food is good, I am so there. And back then, it didn't matter because I could burn it all away so easily.
Now, let's put 'thin' in perspective here. I'm 5'8" and I have good size frame, so when I say I was thin, I still weighed like 135 and wore a size 10. Thin-thin, as in ribs showing and not a spare bit of fat on my frame was when I got down to 110 and wore a size 6. (Due to stress and working and then not eating because of those two things - no dieting involved there.) Even at a size 10, though, people commented on how skinny I was and told me I needed to eat more.
I gained about 20 pounds my senior year in HS. I was dating a man who enjoyed his food and drink. Boy, did he enjoy his drink. I'm pretty sure he was an alcoholic and intent on taking me with him. But that's a story for another time. Suffice it say, I wasn't skinny at that point in my life.
In the months before I got pregnant, I was back down again. A little further down, since I was wearing a size 8 at the time. Then pregnancy hit and I ballooned upwards. I was around 183 by the time I gave birth to a 7 pound, 1 ounce baby girl. So, yeah, most of that extra weight was me.
I finally was on track to get back to 135 when my accident happened about 5 months later. Then my metabolism was so messed up and my body was working so hard to repair everything, I could once again eat like a horse and not gain weight. And I was trying, believe me. I was stuck at 125, inhaling everything I could to help my body repair itself. Eventually, though, that evened back out and I was 136... for years. Which worked for me.
Then I hit 30 and it was like someone put the breaks on my metabolism. Screech! And back came those 20 pounds from HS. (Didn't help that I tried to quit smoking then. Gah.) And I was stuck at 157 for a while.
Before I got married, I had dropped those pounds again. Back to the old 136. With more exercise, of course, and a budget that didn't allow for much extra eating.
Marriage has been awesome for me in many ways. Weight is not one of them. I got happy and then I got pudgy. Lucky for me, Hubs doesn't care. But I chugged my way up to my max weight of about 194 pounds.
That was two and a half years ago. I lost 14 of those pounds last year - by watching what I ate and increasing my activity level. This year? I'm down a pound. (Depending on the day - it's an average.) My activity level is increased again, but I haven't been watching my food intake. I know all I have to do is eat less. But that's the hard part. Eat one piece of pizza instead of two. One scoop of ice cream instead of three. Stop it with the chips and the cookies. Make a salad or soup instead of a big sandwich.
I'm working on it.
Now, I actually feel weird if I don't take a walk every day. So there's that. I feel good and I'm actually pretty healthy. I'm just stuck at 179.
What about you? No, I don't want you to post your weight... Just tell me about your journey or talk about the changes between you now and you then. Have you always battled your weight or is it something you've never needed to worry about?
I was chunky as a kid--one of the tallest in the class and told I was "big boned" but my mother harped on my size. At the same time, if we didn't eat everything on our plate, we were bad. 🙄 All through junior high and high school, I was "heavier" than my peers. In college, I was athletic and we all know muscle weighs more than fat, right? At one point, I was mostly wearing 8s because I had broad shoulders and a butt, but had a 22" waist (me and Scarlett O'Hara!) so my business clothes had to be tailored to fit. I was weighing around 125-130, doing some modeling and commercials and my mother still thought I was heavy. (Amazing I never developed an eating disorder! Except I sort did...) Right before I got married, my thyroid was off and I was fighting to keep weight on at 110-112. A year later, my weight stablized back at 130-135. Got pregnant at 33, "bloomed" to 175 and Only weighed under 5 pounds. Long story. I got most of the pregnancy pounds off, down to 145 and was still wearing 8-10s, with no tailoring. Then menopause happened, joy of joys. The most I've weighed is 215. At one point, after staying on a modified Atkins diet for a year, I was down to the 180s. Normally, I'm 201-207. Lately, I've been under 200. I'm not active. Vicious circle that--weight is hard on my joints (and I had bad knees already) so it's hard to excercise but I can't lose/keep off weight without exercise. Anyway, I've come to grips with my weight and my looks and can even make jokes about it now. But those early scars? Yeah, they still run deep. I did my very best not to do that with Only and thankfully, she has a positive body image even if she isn't in fast-pitch playing shape.
ReplyDeleteAnd you know, if I want a cookie, burger, or loaded bake potato? I eat the damn thing. So there's that. 😊
I was never thin or chunky, but I did end up with an hour glass figure after puberty. Then in my 40s, my metabolism just up and stopped. I felt betrayed!
ReplyDeleteI don't worry too much though. I'm still agile and in better physical condition than most people my age, despite the bum knees.
Now if I could only do something about my clumsiness...